The present disclosure relates to a method for packaging an electronic cooling fan, and more particularly to using a concentrically symmetric connector in a round fan assembly.
In the packaging of modern fans to cool electronic components, round fans are molded into square fan assemblies. The square packaging takes up unnecessary areas in the corners of the cage surrounding the fan due to placing a circular fan in a square assembly. A round fan assembly takes up about 78% of the space of a square assembly.
Another issue with current fan packaging is the placement of the connector. A typical electronic cooling fan requires two to five pins on a connector per rotor, which must be connected into the rest of the system. One method of making these connections is with a blind mate connector; the whole fan assembly docks and makes the electrical connections in one operation. For a hot-swappable fan out of the front or rear of the electronic chassis, the connector must either live within the swept area of the rotor (which impedes the airflow) or outside the swept area of the rotor (which consumes extra area on the chassis that could be used for more components). In either scenario, the wires coming from the center of the fan must traverse from, and cover at least a portion of, the swept area of the fan.
Another issue with current fan packaging is that a hot-swappable fan out of the front or back must be inserted in a specific orientation to dock the connector. As one example, a connector may reside in a corner of the fan assembly, and that corner must be lined up to dock. To prevent the fan assembly from being inserted in the wrong direction, the design engineer must incorporate physical stops into the mating assembly or fan assembly to ensure proper installation.
Another issue associated with current fan assembly connectors is that the connector must typically be retained with a cage. The connectors are typically “panel mount;” they attach to a sheet of material or are retained to a fan cage so that they may be aligned with the receptacle.